


Learning to Dance

by MostlyAnon, naphy



Series: Laughter of the Gods [2]
Category: Dragon Age (Video Games), Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Control, Dalish, Dancing, Dragon Age Kink Meme, Dynamic Character, Espionage, F/M, Gen, Halamshiral, My Fair Lady - Freeform, Orlais, Orlesian Ball, Qunari, Spies, The Game, The Winter Palace (Dragon Age)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-16
Updated: 2015-03-29
Packaged: 2018-03-18 05:20:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 13,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3557552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MostlyAnon/pseuds/MostlyAnon, https://archiveofourown.org/users/naphy/pseuds/naphy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Inquisitor is not that bright. She’s sweet and awkward and moves like a basketful of kittens but she has zero situational awareness and even fewer social skills.</p><p>When it comes time to take her into the firestorm of Celene’s court, both Leliana and Josephine are literally pulling their hair out. Desperate, they decide to bring out the big guns. A Ben-Hassrath spy knows how to re-program people’s heads. He’ll have no problem turning one small woman into a passable Game player.</p><p>Right?</p><p>Right?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

The Inquisitor wasn’t truly hiding.

Hiding involved cowardice and fear. And while she wasn’t exactly afraid of what Hawke would make her do if Hawke found the Inquisitor, she definitely wasn’t in the mood to dodge daggers and try to block them with her staff rather than her magic. For some reason, everyone thought she needed to develop her martial skills, in case the entire world fell apart and she suddenly forgot how to cast a spell. Or something. The Inquisitor usually stopped listening or had to dodge daggers by that point in the explanation.

Now that the Inquisitor thought about it, Hawke really needed to work on her people skills. And her explanations.

She also wasn’t hiding from Josephine, who wanted her to practice ‘the etiquette and manners you will need to know for the ball, if you are to successfully play The Game.’ This had, so far, involved trying to learn sixteen different dances, forty-three different responses to the question “What are you hoping to achieve?” and the uses of no less than seven types of forks. It was almost worse than the daggers.

She’d managed to escape everyone by climbing a tree. It had worked when she was still with her clan and it worked now. Nestled in the lower branches, she contemplated the apple she’d stolen to snack on and thought about how many forks she would have to use to eat it if she were in Orlais.

Above her tree and in a much less comfortable room, someone was wishing they had as easy an escape.

The Iron Bull liked Red. He liked Red just fine. He liked Red just fine somewhere she wasn’t turning those icicle eyes of hers on him rather than one of the poor qalaba that worked under her.

Bull understood Leliana just fine.

He didn’t want to give her the kind of opportunity that would allow her to understand him.

“We have,” said Leliana, her eyes growing even sharper, “a problem.”

For half a heartbeat, even as he put on the blandest, stupidest smile in his repertoire, Bull wondered if she’d found the Tallis he’d recently planted amongst her Feralden spies. Normally the transition was as smooth as the barmaid’s bottom, but this Tallis was new to the Ben-Hassrath and had been a pain in his ass since the very beginning.

Bull mentally toyed with convincing the Boss to drop by Redcliffe so he could remove the idiot, but judging from Leliana’s barely concealed fury, he’d do better to concentrate on replying.

His smile was a little more toothy as he replied. “You want something dead, Red? What is it this time? Insane Templars? Insane mages? Insane mage-Templar dragons?”

He paused. “Please tell me it’s dragons.”

Suddenly, all of the chill vanished from Leliana’s eyes and her expression grew so sweet that Bull felt the sweat start to bead at the back of his neck.

“You know,” she said, her tone casual, “I have so many incompetent employees working for me. Why, one of them even started answering in Qunlat when I asked them a simple question.”

Her voice turned back to full arctic blast. “While carving off their fingers.”

Bull didn’t swear, but it was a near thing. He knew that Tallis was trouble.

Leliana leaned over the desk so that she was barely inches form Bull’s face. “Do not take me for a fool, _Hissrad._ I will respect your position if you show an equal respect for mine.”

Bull didn’t flinch. “What exactly do you want me to do?”

Leliana smiled. It was not a nice smile. “I believe I have the perfect way that you can show your respect and solve a tiny, minor problem for the Inquisition.”

She leaned backwards, her smile predatory. “Tell me, Qunari, what do you know of the Great Game?”

***

There were days when Bull wished he hadn’t been quite as good at lying to Tama about who drank the last cup of cocoa. Idly, he tried to imagine himself as a Sten fighting boring, mindless battles, but all of his enemies seemed to morph into smirking Lelianas.

For a brief moment, Bull admired a hundred different views of Red’s… assets, before shaking his head to clear his thoughts. Frankly, he was pretty sure all of the Fereldan _basra_ were more than a little insane, but that was what made them such dangerous opponents. Bull had no doubt that Leliana would gnaw off her own arm and beat him to death with it if she knew of the extent of his interference.

He knew that he’d gotten off lucky.

That didn’t make what she’d asked any less terrible.

As he casually strolled towards the large tree at the back of the garden, Bull wondered again exactly what Leliana was thinking. With Red, Josephine, and Vivianne working together, what they didn’t know about the Orlesian court wasn’t worth knowing.

While Bull certainly had more knowledge than they realized, teaching The Inquisitor how to play with the nobility was not something he thought they’d leave up to a Qunari mercenary captain.

He frowned.

He was fairly sure that Leliana had been joking about him using secret Qunari mind-control techniques on the Boss.

If only because someone had to have a mind for mind control to work.

He was being a little unfair, he knew, but sometimes he wondered if a lost puppy hadn’t accidentally been transformed into an elf when it fell out of the fade. A surprisingly lovely, wide-eyed, red-headed puppy-

Bull only realized that he was growling when he bit down hard enough to draw blood.

It wasn’t worth thinking about for more reasons than he wanted to explore.

Case in point- Boss thought she was being sneaky and secretive by running away to the garden when she couldn’t handle her Hawke or her advisors anymore. The reality was that everyone in the hold knew that she was out there, but after she’d accidentally knocked out the gardener with a falling apple, no one wanted to get close enough to disturb her.

Now those crazy Feraldens- they would have set the tree on fire and been discovered hanging from a random window at the top of the tower.

The Boss, at least, was predictable.

If there was a stupid way to tackle a situation, she’d find an even stupider way to handle it, although not quite as stupid as the Feraldens. Even as he thought it, Bull felt a strange twinge of guilt. He wasn’t giving the Boss enough credit. They’d survived situations that would have killed lesser companies. Surely he could teach her a few party tricks-

Bull realized what the strange twig and leaf covered lump in front of him actually was. Even as he blinked, a scrawny arm reached out to grab frantically at the crow above it.

Maybe, Bull realized in dawning horror, he hadn’t been giving Boss too little credit.

He’d given her too much.

Somehow, the Inquisitor's apple had turned into a fight to the death with a bird. Not to an actual death, if she were honest, and not really a fight, but more of a ‘dumb bird stole her apple and she’d tried to climb up after it to get it back and what with one thing and another, she _might_ have ended up clinging to one of Leliana's birds with one hand, an apple in the other, one foot on the garden wall and one foot on a very wobbly branch.

"I thought you were supposed to be smarter than this," she said to the bird.

The bird screeched and scratched her wrist, causing her to release both bird and apple, as well as lose her balance. She scrambled to catch another branch on her way down, coming up with handfuls of leaves and just barely managing to jerk to a stop inches from the ground, bobbing gently from an overgrown twig.

The Inquisitor glared at the departing bird, a bird whom she'd decided was the root of all her current problems, up to and including the impending doom waiting to be unleashed upon them all. Birds were less intimidating than hoards of demons backed by an invincible, insane general.

If not for birds, she'd still have lunch.

This all passed idly through her mind as she bobbed gently from the twig. Lost in thought, it took her a moment to notice--

"Hi, Bull," she said, dropping to her feet. She craned her neck to see if Krem was with him. She liked Krem. She said fewer stupid things when Krem was around, because he distracted her from thinking about things like licking the base of Bull's horns and other uses for his mouth, like--

"Apple!" she remembered, belatedly, and scrambled, barely catching her liberated lunch before it smashed into Bull. She grinned triumphantly. "What can I do for you?" she asked, biting into the fruit.

Bull nodded subtly to the “scout” hidden behind the Inquisitor. The man nodded back and faded into the foliage, leaving Bull to give the Boss a genuinely appreciative smile.

It was hard not to be happy to see the elf. She was a creature made to make herself and others happy and Bull couldn’t help the undertone of amusement when he spoke to her. “Well Boss, I was going to see if you wanted to join me and the boys for a meal, but it looks like you’ve got that covered. Though-”

He stretched casually, internally smirking as her gaze landed nowhere near his face “-I was hoping you’d have some time to chat. Wanna head somewhere to talk?”

She nodded, obviously not paying a whole lot of attention. But as soon as he started moving, she scrambled after him, all awkward legs and limbs, that damn apple bobbing along in her mouth.

Bull could have had the conversation in the garden. His scout would have ensured their privacy. But Bull knew what it was like to have a space where you felt safe and could relax, and he didn’t want to taint that for The Inquisitor.

Also walking would give him a few more minutes to think about how to approach this.

He wasn’t sure he wanted the Inquisition to know exactly how much he knew, but he certainly wasn’t going to leave The Inquisitor unprepared and in danger. He’d put all that political crap in words that she’d understand and leave the casual touching and dancing to the Ambassador. He knew that physical dominance was a big part of the Game, but words were all he had to offer the little elf.

Bull had a policy about touching the Boss.

Some subtle directions, protection, to signal to assholes that she wasn’t the easy mark they thought she was.

Those were all acceptable reasons to touch.

What Bull didn’t do was any kind of touching that might let those big, soft eyes think that there was a chance they’d turn the vertical touching into horizontal.

He’d thought about it. He could have taken her up on the painfully clumsy flirtations and greeted her from her bed, ready to play. It would have been easy, too easy, to slip into the special role the Ben-Hassrath had designed for dealing with high profile targets.

Bull thought about his previous assignments to high-ranking officials. It was all about control, but not the safe, boundary-driven control he practiced with scullery maids and stable hands. Sex within his role was not a weapon, but a set of strings. It was his responsibility to build not only loyalty, but dependence.

The best results came from establishing his dominance in the bedroom. Most people weren’t so good about separating out the bedroom from the office, not without considerable help. And he encouraged that blurring, spoke out about their roles publicly to help set them in place.

He had the whole routine pre-set, down to the word to tell him to stop. No input necessary. No input desired. Tell them what they need and then make them need it. Not brainwashing, but careful cultivation until they couldn’t imagine not telling him everything he wanted to know or doing everything he wanted them to do.

He’d hesitated with the Boss.

He told himself it was because he didn’t need to do it, because she listened to everything he had to say anyways. He told himself that the woman couldn’t even hide a nest full of kittens from him (Literally. He still had the scratches.), much less the secrets of the Inquisition.

The truth was, without brainwashing or cultivation or careful personal tending, from the very first moment he met her, the Boss looked up at him like he’d personally brought the sun down from the sky.

It turned out that maybe his post-Seheron re-programming wasn’t quite as thorough as it should have been.

He’d die for her.

But he wouldn’t touch her.

He hoped that it would be enough.

***

There was something, something at the edge of the Inquisitor's awareness, some little flicker, but there was always something flickering in the corner of her eye, something to pay attention to, and more often than not, that something ended up being someone’s lost child, or love, or another new set of issues everyone expected someone to help with, but no one ever volunteered to do.

Most of the time, she thought, she was running errands because she was the only one who paid attention when people asked. What good was saving the world if there wasn’t a world worth saving?

But she didn’t want another errand or to pay attention to a new flicker, she wanted to stay where she was, not-quite-strolling along with Bull and enjoying her apple. His legs were longer, too long to truly stroll and keep up with him at the same time, but he had a habit of slowing down to accommodate her pace, even when they were roaming the countryside, even when the others outdistanced her.

“I found a new place,” she said, veering off to the small courtyard she’d discovered wedged in a crevice formed by the battlements. She could slip through easily enough, though she popped her head back out of the tight corner and held up her arms to her head, miming his horns with decent accuracy towards the spread. “You’ll have to come in sideways. Hawke’s in the tavern.”

The last seemed to be a non sequitor, but otherwise she would have happily followed him there, or down to the practice yard. But Cassandra would be waiting for her in the yard.

The private little courtyard suited her needs, barely a few strides wide and carved mostly out of old rock. She liked it when the sun hit just right; it did now, warming her skin and calming her nerves as she relaxed onto the ancient stone.

“I was thinking about taking Blackwall and Sera after the Visnomer down on the coast,” she said, watching him try to squeeze through. It was a tighter fit with both of them, so she tucked up her legs.

She knew he wanted to talk about the Winter Palace. _Everyone_ wanted to talk to her about the Winter Palace. Cullen had tried to explain the importance of deciding upon a uniform versus a gown to her. She eyed Bull to see if he’d take her bait.

As the silence stretched out, it became obvious that it might not be as straightforward as her previous conversations.

When the time came to actually talk to the Boss, Bull found himself strangely nervous. For one thing, he’d been thinking about not touching and they were currently touching a little too much for his peace of mind. For another, there had been a half a second where something knowing had flickered through her eyes before she had tossed aside her apple core and started to wave and yell at the crow sitting on the wall.

For all that Hawke was a sociopathic nightmare (Bull wasn’t sure if he envied Varric that particular brand of bed play), the Boss had latched onto her like a puppy with a new playmate. For Boss to avoid her…

Or the practice yard which held…

Cassandra…

As Bull realized what was going on, he could only blame his shitty day for how long it took him to put the pieces together.

“You know,” he said admiring how her face looked perched above her knees, “you don’t have to go to Halamshiral.”

He was rather proud of how high she managed to raise her eyebrow. He grinned in return, feeling much more in control of the situation. “Or that’s what I would say if I was just looking to collect a paycheck and thought there was some shitty hole somewhere in Thedas I could hide from Fade demons.”

He continued on, carefully monitoring her expression as he spoke. “I’ll save you the lectures. You’ve heard them all and my ass ain’t as tight as the Commander’s.” He waggled his eyebrows and brought out his best leer. “Seriously, I want to drop something on those cheeks and see if there’s a bounce.”

Before she had a chance to respond, he lowered his head and met her face on, his gaze serious. “All that crap you’re learning has its place, but if you want to succeed in politics you have to learn the big stuff first. And the big stuff is how you’re going to use your strengths to bend the victims to your will.”

He waved a hand, careful not to hit the Boss. “There’s only a few real ways to win in politics. Option one- you charm and blackmail them into agreeing and they follow you because they love you and you hold them by the balls. Option two- you prove that you are smarter and more talented than they are and they follow you because they want to have a piece of the success when you ultimately win. Option three- you beat the crap out of everyone and the ones who are left don’t want to be beaten up anymore.”

“So,” he said, leaning forward, “which do you think is your strength, Boss?”

The Inquisitor eyed a bird that was circling above them and absently narrowed her eyes, sending a shock through the thing. Not enough to actually hurt it, but enough to warn prying eyes that the Inquisitor was not in the mood to be spied on. Sometimes, she wondered if anyone realized she had survived until this point on her own, and just fine.

Well, mostly fine. Her glowing hand was testament to that.

She considered Bull’s choices, as she pulled off her boots to press her bare toes into the rock. (It was better than considering his ass, which she had already done in considerable detail, in the past. Cullen’s was nice, but Bull had power to his haunches, something that made warmth curl in the pit of her stomach.)

The unobservant might mistake her pressing her foot beside his, seemingly absorbed by the comparison, as inattention. But even as she wiggled her toes, she saw troops already following her, a title she’d never asked for, and a mystery as to how it all came to be.

She wasn’t particularly adept at any of the things he described; each could be done better by any number of her retinue and that was the part she didn’t understand— why she had to learn to do these things, why she had to be the focus, when she had no less than three masters of The Game already. All she needed to do, really, was save an empress. That was what bothered her most. She didn't need to win at court. She needed to save one life.

“Does it matter?” she asked, not despondent, her eyes sharp when she met his. “I’m a Dalish mage going to Halamshiral, leading a counter-movement condemned by most of Thedas. If we’re playing any Game, I’ve already lost.”

She sat back and considered the slice of sky, then shook her head abruptly. “I don’t know how I got here, Bull. But I know it wasn’t alone. Which do you think is my strength?” She raised an eyebrow. “Charm? Talent? My bad ass attitude?” She pulled a face at him, her best imitation of Hawke on a bad day.

She wasn’t worried about the Game, not really. She had a job to do and she’d get it done. She already knew the price for losing. It was too dear to pay. “Everyone is talking like I have to win over Orlais, not save Celene.” She hadn’t missed that and sharp ears heard whispers of why it would be better to have a tested military general on the throne, when they needed Orlais’ army.

When she looked at Bull, her gaze was piercing, that of a woman who’d survived the cost of losing. “I think they’re trying to prepare me for a coup, Bull.”

Bull felt an unpleasant chill run the length of his spine.

The Boss wasn’t taking him seriously.

That was… a surprise.

Bull had gotten used to the Boss hanging onto his words and providing often thoughtful, if also strange commentary. This time though she’d brushed off what he was ultimately asking and focused in on the nugshit motivations of the Commander. Bull pushed aside an unfamiliar burst of jealousy. Of course the Boss and the Commander would see this exercise as either “save the Empress” or “establish our own personal army by crowning her successor”.

That she’d missed the larger point wasn’t surprising and ultimately didn’t matter. Bull was far more frustrated that the Boss hadn’t even thought about why she’d been given the responsibilities she had been. It would have been real easy for Red to set the Boss up as a fangless figurehead. Did the Boss even know why she was in charge?

Knowing how to delegate was an invaluable skill as a leader. Building the loyalty that allowed you to delegate? That took years of charm and blackmail… or an intuitive and natural charm and concern that created the same effect.

Not having a skill wasn’t a sin.

Not recognizing your own skills was the greatest possible violation of the Qun.

“I think,” Bull said finally, “that if you think this is about creating a new Game with you at the center, then we really have already lost. Maybe what you should be asking yourself is if you are indeed a Dalish mage going to Halamshiral, leading a counter-movement condemned by most of Thedas, why have you been invited there in the first place? Why not just send a note to Celene’s personal guard to step up their security? Why not send Red and Josie to make all the naughty nobles behave? If we were going to let Celene die, why not send the Commander and his troops to maintain order in the aftermath?”

He tried to keep his breathing even, his thoughts under control. “Why did they specifically want you there?”

He stood up, unwilling to spend any more time in the tiny space until he’d gotten himself under control. As he turned to leave, he looked back over his shoulder, “I’ll ask you again, Lavallen, what do you have that the Winter Court wants?”

Bull strode off, trying to understand what exactly was driving him to leave.

Bull didn’t get disappointed. After Seheron, Bull used his re-programming to make sure he was never again going to be in a situation that he didn’t control. Bull knew what people were going to say weeks before they said it and had already planned his next several months’ worth of responses.

Maybe that was why the bitter taste on his tongue took so long to identify.

Bull was half-way back to the Tavern before he realized he’d left to get his temper under control, three-quarters of the way before he realized that it wasn’t anger he was feeling. When he put the pieces together, the disappointment became paired with the equally unfamiliar taste of fear.

The worst part was that Bull wasn’t sure why he was disappointed, he just knew that he was.

And that was maybe the most frightening part of all.

***

The Inquisitor watched Bull go, resting her chin on her knees and considering what he’d asked. It took her time to absorb— she left him and Hawke to fight out ownership of the tavern and took Sera, Cole, and Blackwell with her to Crestwood while she was still distracted by their conversation. Killing the undead was always a good way to practice her skills and she’d promised to help a Chantry Sister find the bodies of the lost dead.

She came back late, covered in…well, she didn’t particularly care to think about what she was covered in. Her coat was going to need a serious soak before she could wear it again and her boots were almost ruined. She didn’t mind the boots, preferring to go barefoot when she could.

She stomped into the tavern, a barefoot, sodden mess.

“Fine,” she said to Bull, pushing her hair back. “Give me the crash course in the Game. I’m not letting Celene die and if we’re going to do this, we do it right.” She glanced around and found Hawke missing, to her relief. “The things that matter, Bull, not forks and how to hold my glass. You have the outside view, you tell me what I need to focus on.”

She gave Cabot a smile that could have dazzled at Orlais, if she’d been another woman, when the bartender brought her a flagon of ale. She sat down beside Bull and drained some of it, then pointed at him, a little unsteady.

“It’s my Inquisition. They gave it to me, so I’m going in as the Inquisitor and…” She dropped her head to the table and buried her face in her arms. “And the Inquisition can’t look like a backwoods fool,” she muttered to the scarred tabletop.

"I'm not wearing frills."


	2. Chapter 2

Bull didn’t look up when Krem slid in beside him.

He was going to drain every drop of alcohol in this _vashedan-_ filled tavern. If Krem wanted to join him, that was his business. Bull was _done._

Krem waited to speak until Bull had a mouthful of the wyvern-piss they were calling ale. “So, three horses, the practice yard, an exploding ball of fire and a goat headbutting the Commander’s bare arse. If you were trying to destroy Skyhold for the glory of the Qun, you could have invited _me_ along.”

Bull didn’t spit the liquid over the table, although the look he turned on Krem could have stripped flesh from bone.  
Krem just kept that irritating half-smirk on his lips as he waited for Bull to respond.

“Fuck. You.”

Krem waved his arm. “Been there, done that, no more bull riding for me. Bull _baiting_ on the other hand…”  
Bull sighed, running a rough hand over his horns. He really needed to find a way to get ahold of some horn powder, but he wouldn’t let himself be distracted.

Who knew?

Krem might have some useful advice, after he finished the mocking.

“I thought we’d start with something straightforward. Don’t know if anyone in that hellhole has ever seen genuine sincerity and with her big eyes and that smile she’s got- they’d just eat that shit up. All she had to do, nothing to memorize, no need to change her behavior, was to go up to a few of the recruits and ask them why they’d joined the Inquisition. Once she’d got a few answers, she was to come back to me and we’d figure out what parts of the information were useful to build a connection if she was trying to convince ‘em to do something for her. The whole point this time was to talk as little as possible and see what she got from listening.”

Bull shuddered. “If I didn’t have three different eye witness accounts of her shooting out of the Fade, I’d be looking into whether she’s actually a Vint spy in disguise- no offense.”

“None taken.” Krem leaned closer. “Go on…”

“The. One. Recruit. She managed to find the one fucking recruit who was convinced that one of the horses had been possessed by the spirit of his grandfather or his turnip or some such _shit_ and rather than coming back to talk to me…”  


Bull didn’t want to think about how he was never going to be able to go near the stables ever again. “And then, in the confusion, the goat got out and went around the corner of the stable-”

Krem winced, obviously having heard the next part of the story. “And the Commander was taking care of business-”  
Bull nodded. “And _she_ thought he was being attacked and ran after him and then everything was on fire.”

Krem’s face took on a serious expression of thought and Bull had a brief burst of hope that he’d provide something useful.  
Of course the first rule of the Ben-Hassrath was that hope was for idiots.

“Ah,” said Krem, leaning backwards with his hands behind his neck, “it’s a good thing you weren’t trying to teach her to dance.”

Bull contemplated how much he really _needed_ a second-in-command. Fortunately, Krem wasn’t finished. “If breathing the same air as her didn’t make you stupid, you might have considered that Skyhold itself probably makes her nervous. Everyone here’s watching her, expecting things. If you want her to learn, she’s got to be somewhere she feels safe to learn.”  


Bull nodded, anger forgotten. “A trip out would do both of us some good and make it easier to concentrate on the important things. Boss is starting to avoid Josie like she’s darkspawn.”

“Plus,” said Krem, his grin growing ever wider, “it’s got to be less flammable than Skyhold.”

***

It wasn’t hard for Hawke to get the advisors to back off on her elf,. Cullen was more than happy to leave any and all wardrobe decisions to _anyone else, he had enough to do as it was,_ Cassandra had already washed her hands of the entire thing, and Josephine and Leliana… All that took was the right invitation, issued from the right person, to keep them busy.  
Hawke had hated hobnobbing in Kirkwall, but The Champion was allowed different standards. For all her elf could hold her own, she hadn’t yet figured out what she really was to the world. Hawke could at least try to smooth some of the harder edges of the learning curve.

So it was that an invitation was issued to the single noble Hawke could stand. Sebastian could put any hot-blooded woman at ease and often had. She’d found court easier to tolerate with him and Varric at her back. Sebastian covered her gaffes and soothed ruffled feathers with half a smile and his easy manner…

And it made a nice enough payback, inviting a handsome prince to help their Inquisitor. She still owed Bull for a nasty bluff in their last game of Wicked Grace.

When Josephine expressed surprise at Hawke’s interest in what they would wear, she got little answer from the woman, but Varric put it together, watching Hawke care for her armor. The Armor of the Champion, she called it, and when she wore it, she became impossible to ignore.

“The armor makes me The Champion,” read the note she left on the pile of silk and reinforced fabric.

The elf didn’t know if it worked or not, but she felt… more powerful, more connected, wearing the uniform. It didn’t blend in with the gowns, nor did it seek to try, instead, it was proud to be different.

She wore it once, to show Hawke, and for the first time, she’d been saluted by troops as she passed, greeted with deference by the multitudes. After Hawke’s approval, she’d barely been able to get it off quick enough—the suit had too much power to wear casually.

She didn’t wear it when Bull suggested they get out of Skyhold. She wore old leather, comfortable and familiar, and soft boots made for running, stained by old blood. Surprised that it was just the two of them, she felt the unease slip away as Skyhold fell to the distance, leaving behind the constant attention and focus of the… _her_ people.

It was easier to breathe away from the hold and she reminded herself to kiss Krem when she got back. He’d understood her jumbled torrent of an explanation for what it was—a plea for help.

Cheerful for the first time in a long while, she entertained herself by sparking the tips of Bull’s horns, honing her innocent look as she scrambled about to collect herbs and minerals.

***

Bull’s normal idea of mentoring involved grabbing the kid by the scruff of their neck, tossing them into a circle of enemies, and shouting, “Keep your horns up.”

It wasn’t that he hadn’t taught more diplomatic skills before but there was a reason that his cover was “Mercenary captain who kills things. _Lots_ of things.”

After Seheron, after fucking _Tevinter,_ Bull expected every piece of his carefully constructed web to immediately get their shit together and start spinning. He had patience in serpents, but he had no room left for incompetence.  
Dealing with the Boss was the first jolt to his carefully constructed system in longer than he cared to remember. He was sure that she wasn’t incompetent, but she was a magnet for the worst kind of trouble and needed processing time that just wasn’t possible in most of the situations they faced.

He didn’t want to make her into a Player and it wasn’t to her advantage to be one. The truth was that she was far better off as an exotic, unpredictable entity than a mediocre Game chaser. The even colder truth was that she was always going to be Dalish and something like an exotic pet of the Seeker or the Sister or whoever they assumed was pulling her strings.  
If she knew how to use all the forks, they were going to see her as a housebroken nug. If she didn’t know how to use all of the forks, they were going to see her as an unhousebroken nug. One way or another, they’d still see her as a nug. So, much like Bull played the untameable savage, the Boss needed to make the exotic a statement of power rather than one of weakness.  


She had charm and interest and otherness in serpents. All she had to do was make sure they were too interested in her to care about forks.

Bull had plans.

He had some ideas about some smaller villages to visit with a few conversational gambits the Boss could try out.  
As usual, she’d managed to throw the whole thing off.

In hindsight, he should have realized that “paying attention to where she was going” ranked well below “picking the fucking elfroot growing off the edge of the cliff”. That he’d managed to have a rope on hand to lasso her showed that his normal pattern recognition skills had finally caught up with her habits.

After he managed to get his heart back down from his throat and into his chest (he was lucky that his aim still worked during a whiteout of blind panic), he’d carefully lowered her onto the most stable looking ledge.

He just-

He needed a minute for his hands to stop shaking before he pulled her up.

Whatever he said to others, Bull didn’t lie to himself. The impending shit he was about to wade in was no longer something he could ignore. Looking down at her, with the rope still snug around her waist, safe and alive-

He needed to put her on a leash permanently.

It was probably the first time he’d had that thought without a sexual undertone.

Although thinking about it-

No.

He needed to get her back up.

Huh- if he squinted at the ledge, was there something there with her?

He hadn’t paid much attention to the rock outcropping, other than a check for stability, but there was a definitely a round object beside the Inquisitor-

Who wasn’t sure why Bull was so upset—it wasn’t as if she’d fallen that far and mostly she was just dusty and a little bruised from the sudden jerk of the rope around her waist. She swung, getting her breath back after the rush of falling, and thought about how much fun doing something like that on purpose could be… maybe with a safety rope already on before one jumped.

“Nice catch!” she called up at Bull, setting lightly on the ledge. She had her elfroot, too, enough to make a remedy for that healer who desperately needed it. She stowed the herb carefully, paying more attention to that than her surroundings. Lives depended on the herbs.

Above her, Bull watched her with growing dread as a rock began to shake.

-rocking back and forth-

-as cracks appeared in its surface-

As Bull threw himself over the side of the cliff, his last thought was that he was going to ask to be reprogrammed as a bookkeeper.

The Inquisitor slipped out of the rope and crept forward to investigate. What had at first glance appeared to be an overlarge rock was actually an egg, mottled and now riddled with cracks. She made a soft sound of delight as an iridescent head poked through with a mighty thrust. She reached out to steady the egg, keeping it from rocking too close to the edge.

A tiny Mistral revealed herself, shaking off bits of eggshell and keening wildly. The Inquisitor laughed, cooing soothing words as she helped the poor thing break free of its prison, carefully picking away the sharper pieces. When the tiny thing nipped at her, she snapped her fingers back at it, then fished through her pack to find a piece of the venison jerky out of their trail rations. She offered the little creature the meat, one torn piece at a time.

“Bull, look!” She craned her head around, looking for a nest or the mother. “How do you think she got here? Hey, that’s a finger!” she admonished the tiny dragon, as it nipped at her again and then tipped into her lap. “She’s so small,” she wondered, stroking the damp hide.

Bull glared.

“No.”

Everything hurt.

His entire body was one huge, fucking bruise.

He had just managed to find a stable object on the cliff top to anchor his rope and had wrenched his shoulder making sure it was secure.

He was not answering the fucking questions. She was not getting those kind of ideas. He’d just dove over the edge of a fucking cliff to protect her and she was not going to play house with the spawn of _Ataashi._

Since the fall seemed to have shaken her brain loose, he knew that she’d not only forgotten what that pile of teeth and claws was going to turn into, but what it meant was lurking in the mountain if there were dragonlings popping out of eggs.

Bull knew he couldn’t kill the thing without turning the Boss into a raving fury of destruction (although, that was a pretty sexy thought for later). They could leave it right where it was until Mama dragon came back to carry it off. One way or another, they were not bringing a dragon back to Skyhold. Bull lived for the thought of fighting dragons, but even he had to admit he was in no shape to take out an angry Mama. Even if angry Mama wasn’t in the cards, deliberately bringing something who lived to eat livestock and humans back to Skyhold seemed a fast track to a painful interrogation by Sister Nightingale.

He tried to summon all of his considerable charm into an even, reasonable tone of voice. “Now it wouldn’t be fair to take the… baby away from its home, would it? Let’s get going before its mother comes back and fries the shit out of us.”

The Boss just looked up at him, her huge eyes sad and limpid as she rocked the dragonling on her shoulder.

Bull had lived in fear of demons his entire life, but he had the sudden, dizzying knowledge that he had just spent the last few months under a particularly insidious demonic thrall.

“Don’t,” Bull said through gritted teeth. “Don’t look at me like that.”

The she-demon’s eyes just got wider in her confusion. The tiny thing in her arms let out a small belch of flame and she cooed. _She actually cooed._

“Fuck me,” Bull said under his breath. He’d never meant it more sincerely.

As Bull climbed the cliff with a set of sharp claws firmly digging into his neck, he hoped that Leliana would be generous enough to kill him quickly.


	3. Chapter 3

There were few things more terrifying than watching a woman with a knife teach a woman who constantly shot accidental fireballs how to dance.

Bull wasn’t in the mood to be aroused. He couldn’t even promise himself _Taarsidath-an halsaam_ because he was not allowed to be thinking about touching the Boss.

He _couldn’t_ touch the Boss.

He just wished everyone else would respect that decision.

Varric, the great fucking pervert, certainly looked like he was enjoying the scene.

Bull, on the other hand, spent half the time Hawke danced with the Boss flinching everytime something sharp and metallic got near an artery and the other half trying to figure out ways a giant Qunari could disappear from a crowded tavern without being noticed. He’d pay dearly for the silence and solace of an empty tent and some numbing salve.

To be fair, Bull had been in an extraordinarily bad mood before being dragged out to watch this mess. He still hadn’t recovered full range of motion in his shoulder, which meant that Krem was preventing him from going on a very healthy killing rampage with his boys. Leliana had torn him a strip up one side and down the other when he got back to Skyhold. Between their scaly new friend and both of them looking less like they’d been on a diplomatic mission and more like they’d _fallen down a fucking cliff,_ Red had thought Bull was breaking his promise. It was only the fact that the Boss had neatly handled one of the visiting nobles and Leliana had given him credit for the training that had spared him an instant interrogation.

As for the dragonling…

It didn’t stay small for very long. The thing was larger than a horse now. The only reason Bull wasn’t dead once it started to swell up was because it seemed to have an unholy attachment to the Boss and Bull could practically see Red mapping out its future uses in her head.

He’d just been told by the healer that he shouldn’t be swinging a sword for at least another week and Red had stuck her head in, smirking, to say that it meant he had more time to practice being a Dragon Papa. 

He hadn’t wanted to be there in the first place and if Maryden played “Sera was Never” one more time, Bull wouldn’t be responsible for turning Tal-Vashoth on the spot. Perfect pitch was an unusual Qunari curse and Bull wished there was some way to remove it. Like most Qunari curses, when Maryden finally stopped for a minute, things got significantly worse.

Bull’s first sign that things were about to really go to shit was the look on Hawke’s face as she approached.

Hawke half fell into a chair by Bull, stretched out her legs, and watched the Inquisitor enjoy herself on the floor. “If you ambush her into it, you can do it,” she said. “She needs to know how to waltz. Even I know she won’t get out of the Winter Palace without one.”

Without looking at him, she took her dagger out and began to clean her nails. “She’s comfortable touching you,” she added. “And I bet Sera twenty crowns you could manage it.”

The transparent machinations made his head throb in time with his shoulder.

For someone who was as hard-edged as Hawke, her manipulations were easier to see through than a pane of Chantry glass. Even if the Boss needed to dance, her partners would be nowhere near Bull’s size and range of movement. She would be far better off using Josie as a prop than developing a center of balance around a Qunari partner.

The urge to kill things was a thick haze in his mouth and Hawke’s needling was a scraping piece of flint hovering above a pile of kindling.

If Hawke was interested in teaching the Boss some dancing involving considerable size differences…

Bull’s smile was more teeth than anything. “Hey Varric, looks like we got a problem that needs your kind of solution.”

As he faced Hawke, his horns sparked in anticipation. “You know, you’re not the only one who has an ongoing bet with Sera. And since you’re so fucking eager to help-”

He turned towards the approaching dwarf. “I know for a fact that trigger-happy knows the waltz. So let’s see how your vertical dancing compares to the horizontal.”

With both Hawke and Bull staring at him, Varric looked like he was being hunted. 

“Oh, no, you’re not dragging me into this,” he said, shaking his head. “I still have nightmares about the _last_ time. Besides that…” he watched as the Inquisitor finished her drink seconds before Cabot finished his, slamming her mug down in triumph. “I believe that particular dance is always lady’s choice.”

Varric raised an eyebrow as the Inquisitor wove her way over to where they stood. The elf narrowed her eyes slightly at the group, then snagged Bull’s hand like a shackle. 

“Come on, you can’t just _watch._ This is the first time this has been any fun!” She threw her weight into dragging Bull up, out of his chair before he had a chance to protest.

Something inside Bull snapped.

Bull pulled himself inwards, twisting the fraying threads behind their cage bars and snapped them shut. It was a technique used to survive hostile interrogation. 

It was not an inappropriate use.

Slowly, coldly, Bull rose from his seat.

His mind settled into the calm void of detachment as he led the Boss out to the floor and silently, professionally showed her the steps to the Orlesian waltz.

He didn’t speak.

He kept their bodies at the correct distance, correcting her stance or her steps through simple, light touches. The Boss looked as if she would speak, but every time her mouth opened she closed it again, worrying at her lip with her teeth.

Bull let it pass over him, much as he let the pain from his shoulder pass over as he showed her to do a turn with her partner.

As they turned, he caught an accidental glimpse of her empty mug sitting carefully in the center of the counter.

He had avoided the truth in a way that shamed him, shamed his Qun.

Lavallen had more concern about preventing the breaking of a flagon of ale than she did about him. He was an object to ogle and to use with less care than a tavern’s supplies. It was not the first time he had been an object to his target. But it was the first time he had allowed it to affect his own perceptions.

And that was a shame he would bear.

Lavallen kept trying to catch his gaze but Bull was fixed on a far different horizon, in a far different time and place.

Re-education was not always as thorough as those of the Viddathlok would hope.

Once they were finished, Bull removed his hands and bowed deeply.

He exited the room.

He did not look back.

He did not expect the Inquisitor to stalk out after him.

"Hey!" she said, sparks visible at the tips of her fingers. "You could have just said no." Despite her apparent confidence, the words ended on a waver, uncertainty stealing over her features.

“Could I have?”

Before she found an answer, Krem was there, obviously angry at Bull risking his recovery. Bull could see the instant Krem realized what Bull had done. Krem was beside him in a blur of motion, then between him and the Inquisitor, smiling, bowing.

“Sorry, ma’am. Looks like we’re done out for the night. Don’t let us interrupt your fun.”

Didn’t leave her a chance to respond- Krem was already moving them out of there. Krem’s arm was around Bull’s waist. Just two drunken friends escorting one another home. No one was close enough to see Krem hitting the pressure points that would allow Bull to slowly let go of his mind.

No one to see Krem escort him to the safe tent, to let him weather the first burst of blocked pain.

When Bull finally bellowed, Krem’s lips were a thin white line against his face.

“You won’t do that again. You ever do that again, I’ll break the contract and drag you out of here myself.”

Two days ago Bull would have challenged Krem to a fight, two hours ago Bull would have bellowed and protested.

Now…

Now, Bull nodded.

It felt like an ending.


	4. Chapter 4

The Inquisitor stayed away for the next few days, dragging Hawke with her on errands suddenly demanding her full attention, throwing herself viciously into healing rifts. At least that still made sense, and she drove herself mercilessly until Hawke finally refused her. After that, she simply went alone save for Fluff, who had as intense a focus on destruction as she did. Fire, never far from her, came to call in purging waves, electricity sparked her fingertips when she was at the hold. 

She snarled at anyone who mentioned the Winter Palace, even as preparations were made to go. When Sebastian arrived, she greeted him with the cool civility of a queen, then left him to Josephine.

She hid in her dragon's nest to cry, when tears, confusion, and exhaustion finally overwhelmed her.

***

“She’s not going to figure it out.”

Bull was so happy he’d finally been able to decapitate some Vint slavers that he didn’t turn around and take Krem’s head off.

Krem didn’t look worried anyways, the bastard. He coolly sat himself down beside Bull and continued. “She’s good at noticing things, but you were in the safe box of things she didn’t have to notice. I mean you were just quiet and detached and that was enough to dissolve her into a blithering wreck.”

He waved his hand. “Oh, I don’t mean that you were wrong. Doing the head lockup was pure shit and I’ll kick your balls down your throat if you ever try it again, but the rest of it? You’ve been getting more bashed up collecting herbs with her than fighting the actual crazies. And she keeps pulling you back out before you get properly healed. For all that she was so tied into your advice when you started here, she’s been ignoring your suggestions for longer than either of us want to think about.”

Krem turned to him fully, his gaze cutting somewhere deep. “But I know what the rest of the boys don’t. You could have left months ago. Your people are in place and the Big Boys had all sorts of other assignments you could be doing. Even now, you still wrote the Gatt that you had work to do here and that was yesterday. You’ve still got two or three of your pets following her at a distance since you’re not out there yourself.”

“So what do you want?”

Bull sighed, not even attempting to deny Krem. “She doesn’t need me to get her ready for the Palace. Even Leliana’s realized that her best bet is to go in just as she is and charm them with her exoticism.”

Krem looked him straight in the eye. “She’ll fail. As she is right now, she’s too out of balance to make the decisions she needs to make. Without you at her back, someone’s going to knife her from behind. Hawke’s good, but she’s not that good. So again, I’ll ask you, what do you want?”

Bull gave the question the attention it deserved and when he replied it was in a voice stripped of everything but exhaustion. “I’ve never treated her as a target, even when I should have. I don’t need an apology and I probably owe her one myself, but I need to have at least some respect in our working arrangement. I need to not just be her battering ram with an undeniably sexy ass.”

Krem nodded, a strange light in his eyes. “That much I think I can do.”

As Krem rose, expression cheerful, Bull wondered if he’d accidentally sold his soul.

He shrugged.

It wasn’t as if he was using it anyways.

***

The Inquisitor was hiding again, but this time, she wasn’t up a tree. She was back in her hide-hole, stretched out on the sun warmed rocks, trying to sort out her life. It had gotten unbelievably complicated even before she was invited to the Winter Palace, and she was starting to suspect Varric was right about her luck.

She’d accidentally fried three scout birds, unfocused as she was. She usually didn’t kill the things, not when they took so long to train. But fire came too easily when she felt like a vortex of chaos, herself.

She pressed her cheek into the stone and shut her eyes, clearing her mind of everything, letting the fire burn away all her thoughts until there was nothing except room to breathe. Carefully, she began to reconstruct her life the way she wanted it, growing grass underfoot, arcing trees overhead, the blue sky and fresh air. Too dull, she birthed a dragon, and smiled faintly as the memory came to flush out the rest— Bull’s ecstatic laughter, the fury of magic fully unleashed, the joy that came from battling with a crew that had her back. She let her mind drift at ease in the memory, played with it, bringing back Bull as he’d been, just as ready to take on the world as she was, thrilled at taking down something so close to a god. Genuine joy in his eyes, triumph, the dizzying feel of getting spun about. 

She let herself drift upon that, felt the fire calm and the world tip right.

***

 

It wasn’t that Bull didn’t trust Krem. It was that after the incident with the goat, the Archon, and the oversized ball gag, Bull didn’t trust Krem with _situations like this._ Which explained why he was hiding as stealthily as a giant fucking Qunari could hide while Krem crawled into the hole in the wall to talk with the Boss. 

The wall Bull was leaning against had excellent acoustics for her secret space, and Bull wasn’t above eavesdropping to find out what he’d committed himself to.

Unfortunately, while it seemed that Krem was helpfully speaking somewhere audible, the Boss was little more than a blurred buzzing noise. Based on the one side of the conversation Bull could hear, this was probably reason for concern.  
 _  
”Morning ma’am, you have a minute?”_

_(inaudible buzzing)_

_“Not sick. Angry? Do you think he is?”_

_(more buzzing)_

_“Well, think of it this way. Think about sitting in the throne room, all those shemlen staring up at you, none of them giving a shit about who you are or what you think, only what the pretty exotic thing can give to ‘em. Not caring how much they have to break you to get it.”_

_(aggravated buzzing)_

_“Probably flattered that you think he’s pretty. Pretty or not, he’s getting a bit broken and not in the ways he enjoys getting broken.”_

_(angry and then… curious buzzing?)_

_“Lots of lubrication and a safe word. As for the other, we all like to think we matter, even someone like the Captain. It helps to be reminded that what we want matters. But you already know that.”_

_(subdued buzzing)_

_“Nah, just introduce me to Prince Tightpants. He looks like a fun ride.”_

_(warm buzzing)_

_“Glad we had this chat. You know… when you know what you want and how to say it, it’s a lot easier to see what other people want too.”  
_  
The buzzing cut off and Bull was still trying to piece the conversation together when he felt the tap on his shoulder.

Krem quirked an eyebrow. “You are not nearly as subtle as you think you are.”

Bull groaned. “I must be losing my fucking mind.”

Krem smiled softly, his hand gentle on Bull’s arm. “But what a way to go.”

***

The Inquisitor waited. It always seemed like she thought slower than the rest of the world, but she thought deeply about what Krem had told her, wearing her introspection like armor. By the time she finally had everything as sorted as she could, it was night, and raining besides.

She liked the rain, never quite sure why people were always in such a hurry to get out of it. The mud squished pleasantly under her boots as she tracked Bull to the tents he and the crew kept, then to Bull’s own tent.

Because she knew better, she stood a minute outside it, listening to see if he was alone. Once assured that he was, she stuck her arm past the flap, peace offering in hand.

For half a second, Bull was sure that a desire demon had materialized inside his tent. It was incredibly depressing that his deepest desire was apparently a jar of horn powder, but the body that was carrying it he could _definitely_ work with.

Once he’d regained his mental equilibrium, she’d taken his slack-jawed staring as a sign to carefully move inside the tent. She hovered near the door, but Bull wasn’t sure he was up to inviting her much closer anyways. 

He was going to take the horn powder though.

Bull closed his eyes and re-centered.

He’d done his thinking and readjusted his role in relationship to the Boss. He could stop behaving like a hornless teenager at any point now. It was so far beyond embarrassing that Bull was tempted to call Krem to put him out of his misery.

He looked over at the Boss and used the skills that had brought him to where he was, all those observations that had made him the most fearsome spy master in Thedas.

“You’ve got a hole in your shift.”

It was showing a lovely rose-colored nipple.

It was _not helping._

Bull looked up at the ceiling of the tent, resigned himself to ridiculousness, and started laughing. “You know, Boss, I’d say something powerful and moving, but that’s not how this works. I’d get halfway through the speech before a goat burst in here or Krem dumped a bucket of water on the tent. I think I’d better stick with what we know works.”

He faced her then, willing to see if she understood. “I want to know what you’re thinking, Boss. I want to know if I’m going to be able to work with the person who presents those thoughts.”

He leaned back, spreading his arms. “Thanks for the horn powder. Now lay it on me.”

The Inquisitor looked down at her shirt and sighed, as if at a naughty but beloved child. Immodest, she shrugged her shoulders. “This is why I can’t have nice things,” she said.

The elf opened the jar of powder, ducking behind Bull. The little lid made a place to add water and she swirled her fingers through the powder and water to make a balm of the stuff. Instructions had come care of Krem, though the powder was something Varric had tracked down for her.

She hesitated, though, waiting for a nod of permission before starting to rub the balm in. Krem had the oddest smile when he taught her how to use the balm, especially when he mentioned rubbing the salve along the bases, tiny circles, then soothing the rest up the length of the horn in long strokes.

“You don’t like Hawke,” she said, after a while, remembering that they were talking. “You weren’t happy and Hawke was settled in to bother you.” 

She took another handful of salve, tasted it absently, then wrinkled her nose and started working on his other horn. “I was trying to help. To rescue you so—“ she trailed off, leaving the rest unsaid. So he could relax after babysitting her. So she could repay him for helping her. So he didn’t have to try and kill the woman.

“I’m sorry,” she said instead, simply.

“Accepted.”

Nobody had ever accused Bull of being modest, but there was a reason horn care was done privately, either alone or with lovers. He obviously owed this particular piece of torture to Krem and his own smart mouth. Perfect line of vision to that ripe little nipple too every time she came around the front. Bull’s attempts to stop watching it had nothing to do with embarrassment and everything to do with not flipping the Inquisitor over his chair back and rutting her into the ground.

Luckily it only took thinking about the other part of the conversation to kill any desire he might have had.

He spoke gently, not wanting to disturb the fragile peace between them, but there was a core of steel sitting under his words. “Sometimes it’s good to ask. And sometimes ‘no’ is a real answer.”

Not that he’d ever said it to her before, but that was the problem wasn’t it? He’d never have put up with that shit from his bed partners. He sure as hell shouldn’t have been putting up with it in situations where he was risking his life and the lives of others.

He turned slightly, so that he could see her. “We tell each other what we want, even if it takes us a while to figure it out. No making the decision for me unless it’s as the Inquisitor. If you want to be the Inquisitor all the time with me, I’ll respect that, but if you want to be something else, then you have to respect me.”

It was better to have it out. There were other, more honeyed ways, Bull could have set out the new path. Led her into the routes he wanted her to travel without her ever being aware she was being led. But Bull knew what he wanted.

He hoped she did too.

“I’ll remember next time.” No excuses, no platitudes. Just an easy promise to try for better. She hadn’t meant to hurt him, but she had and there was no other words to use for that. Fancying up an apology took the sincerity from it.

For a bit, she focused on his horns, the texture under her fingertips rough, slick with the grease of the balm. She liked the shape of them, the width of his frame, and it wasn’t often she got to touch him, not as she’d like. His comments burned into her with a gentler warmth than furious fire, but she pushed it aside. He’d yet to make any comment regarding her flirtations and so she didn’t think of it, now.

“I need you,” she said, rubbing the balm into her hands and carefully massaging in the last bits. She was focused enough to lose track of her own thoughts, though they came eventually back to her.

“I need you at my back for Halamshiral,” she said, finishing and resting her chin on his good shoulder in an affectionate gesture. “Will you come?”


	5. Chapter 5

Halamshiral was the armpit of Orlesian pleasure palaces.

The Boss was staring, wide-eyed, at the equally overdone decorations and people, but all Bull could think about was whether or not it was a deliberate insult to invite the Inquisition here rather than one of Celene’s other holdings.

Security was also complete nugshit.

He’d never seen a place that announced more obviously, “Assassinate me, please!”

No crowd control and, while he’d normally be interested in wringing the nobles for information, if another anonymous hand reached out to fondle his balls, Bull wouldn’t be responsible for living up to the Qunari stereotype.

As Bull fought against adjusting his poorly-fitting collar, he half-wished that he had allowed that house-sized monstrosity to come with them. Red had gotten herself a very petty revenge by stuffing him into this faux-military jester garb, but he had put his foot down on bringing an adolescent dragon into the court. Why both she and the Inquisitor had lost their minds, Bull had no idea. But after some very graphic descriptions of accidental tail-based decapitation, they had reluctantly agreed to leave “Fluffy” behind at the base camp.

The Inquisitor at least, was wearing a decent costume of power. He was proud of her. She had taken some of his advice, both on speaking to people and how she was carrying herself. She was a shining light.

Just as he’d known she would be.

Bull shook his head and re-focused, taking a quick scan around the rest of the ballroom.

Most of the Inquisition looked stiff, if not slightly out of place, except for a few strange exceptions.

Baldie looked as if he’d been born to hold court, and wasn’t that an interesting thought for later?

Bull’s grin widened as he looked at the other unqualified social success.

Krem had a proprietary grip around Starkhaven’s waist and was cheerfully charming an entire circle of Orlesian nobility. Several months ago, Bull would have joined them himself. Now, he just shook his head wryly and kept a sharp eye out for any large urns, columns or masked assholes the Boss might wander into.

He nodded slightly at one of his “partiers” as he passed. They’d been quietly disposing of the assassins in the crowd for the last half hour. The fact that no one had revealed the mastermind yet meant that the theory about this being tied into the rifts was probably correct.

Bull was going to be more than happy to be done with this shit. He was a little disappointed that he’d miss out on the orgy part of the evening, but orgies were only as fun as the people participating.

As another hand groped down the back of his ass, Bull realized that an orgy at Halamshiral would be slightly more fun than a gaping chest wound.

***

A palace built on the blood and bone of her people, filled with gilt and greed. The Inquisitor couldn't help but find it beautiful, despite the insult of the invitation. She wasn't the most socially adept, but even she could feel a slap in the face. Invite the Dalish to the 'Winter Palace.' Look at the rabbit sniff about.

She should have brought Fluffy anyway.

Despite herself, she found that people remained the same, dressed in gowns or burlap sacks. She particularly enjoyed meeting the Dowager, and eyed the dance floor with envy. But after adventure and the intrigue of the last dance, she doubted there'd be another.

She gave passing thought to waltzing with Bull and felt the anger at her advisors twist sharply to sickening regret. She could dance in Skyhold when this was done. 

Done her way, advisors be dammed.

She veered off to stalk over to where Bull was observing the mess, sat beside him in graceful fury.

"The next person who tells me the benefits of backing Gaspard goes up in smoke," she told him. "Or putting an elf on the throne. Or--" she huffed, out of protests but still furious. "Why even bother saving the world? Why not just kill them all and make me the empress? I always wanted an empire." The last was practically spat as she watched Cullen cross the room.

Bull shrugged. It was hard to work up righteous indignation over the rotting corpse that was Orlesian politics. “Celene’s no angel. None of them are. Leaving the existing shit in place is as much of a bloody decision as overthrowing the current throne. With enough power, you could force them all to work together and they’d be so busy watching their backs for knives that shit might actually get done. Otherwise…”

Bull thought of the nobles running their horses over the peasants’ fields of crops and once the farmers had barely survived starvation and re-planted, running their horses again. At least in Par Vollen everyone ate.

The Boss would never be empress. Oh, Bull knew she thought she was delivering a scathing indictment of the Commander, but the cold truth was that black and white thinking would get her killed long before she ascended any political ranks but those of the Inquisition.

Bull wasn’t sure whether he wanted to preserve that crystal clear morality or shatter it into tiny pieces. They all had blood on their hands. He just preferred to be honest with himself about it.

In the end, he said nothing else, smiling at the Boss far more gently than he’d planned. The truth was that she hadn’t been a warrior, hadn’t been someone who made those kinds of hard decisions. And he loved that clean, bright conviction that was so sure she could make the world a better place than the rot at its core.

Sometimes she made him hope that she was right.

As Bull knew, hope was a dangerous thing.

"Celene's rule is stable," the Inquisitor said. "And she doesn't want an expanded empire, on top of it. We'll need stability after this is all done, not a new Emperor."

The palace weighed on her, tightening. Would the Inquisition become an empire? Good intentions and hope were half her power, but she could see the seeds starting in Vivianne's calculating gaze, in the ranks of troops Cullen collected, in every caw of those damn birds.

She wasn't leading the dragon, she was riding on its back.

She waved at Krem, then smiled up at Bull, happy to push her thoughts aside, have a moment's rest with someone she actually liked. She stood up and took his hand, tugging in gentle invitation to follow. "The gardens are mostly empty. Tell me your impressions?"

Careful to ask, though the Inquisitor was the one who needed the information, the woman was the one who needed the break. It was easy enough to find privacy in the gardens, especially when she sent static energy shooting out along the ground around them, sparking at least one potential eavesdropper and convincing them to move along.

Bull smiled, realizing what he was choosing by allowing the casual touching, by allowing her to blur the needs of the Inquisitor and the woman. 

Eh.

He’d always liked living a bit dangerously.

Besides, she was getting better at talking. The true test would be whether she remembered to _ask._

Switching over to observer and spy reporting was easy enough since he never really stopped. “My impressions? They’ve got these candies, these nuts with some kind of spice on them. Sweet until you swallow, and then, bam, hot! So fucking good.”

When the Boss looked at him like he’d temporarily swapped his brain for stupid, he continued. “ _Too_ good. They’ve been laced. Someone wanted the chevaliers and the normal guests out-of-commission if something happened. Give ‘em a nice high, lack of physical coordination, but no permanent damage. A considerate coup. It’s been taken care of.” His corps were checking the rest of the food after removing the candies. The fact that someone was able to poison food directly from the Empress’ kitchen led to some… interesting possibilities.

“Biggest impression? A lot of nobles fucking people they shouldn’t be fucking. They think the plumage covers up the lying. It just makes it harder to tell the dangerous lies from the normal ones. Masks are useless for hiding body language and how they speak. They just make it a pain in the ass to instantly identify the bodies.”

He paused thoughtfully. “Makes it easy to tell the assassins though. They’re the only ones not thinking about fucking. Except for the smart ones who force themselves to think about fucking. So, mainly, it’s a wash.”

It hadn’t escaped his notice that the Boss’ shoulders had come down three inches since they’d entered the garden, her face noticeably losing tension. “So how you holding out, Boss?”

The Inquisitor walked along with Bull, not dropping his hand. Hers fit snug inside it, delicate fingers laced along his think ones, shaped nails against claw. The gardens were beautiful in an organized, controlled way, nothing like the wilds she grew up with. Then again, the wilds didn’t have such a broad range of flora, important to suit an Empress’ whim. The night smelled like flowers, not like a forest, and the music still drifted on the air, dampened by distance. If she shut her eyes, she could still see the ballroom, humid and hot with overcrowding, stinking of perfumes and cologne.

“Thank you,” she said, knowing that the candies weren’t the only danger he’d disposed of, glad of it. Krem had come along and she didn’t doubt Bull had a few more Chargers hiding somewhere, and half the Inquisition was versed in espionage. She had told a stark truth when she told him she needed him there to back her up. 

She knew now, the answer to his question. She wasn’t graceful, or charming, or scary. She was simply good at seeing people for what they could be. She wasn’t sure if it was her that changed potential to actuality; she wouldn’t give herself that much credit. But her strength lay with others, her strength was her Inquisition.

“I hear interesting things,” she said, leaning a little so her arm rested against his. She was growing tired of Halamshiral’s politics. “They’re too used to elves being invisible to notice me, half the time.”

Her smile was sharp, though. She didn’t mind being unseen, since it let her discover so many more interesting details. She’d recruited at least one agent so far.

“The rest of them gawk. Briala found me and tried to appeal to my ears.” She disliked the woman for that. It left a bad taste in her mouth, made her wish the other elf had tried to talk up Sera, instead. “It’s exhausting, listening to everyone say three things at once.” 

She stopped and let go of his hand to scoop up a small coin from the grass. Delighted with it, she pocketed the piece of gold before coming back to him, tilting her head back to look up at him. “Do you want to dance?” she asked. It was the only thing she actually _wanted_ to do, dancing. Maybe Josephine would be able to arrange a ball at Skyhold, something more fun than this farce.

Bull wanted.

Bull _always_ wanted.

Tama had always shaken her head at him, her eyes holding that strange, sad distance, when he told her of all the things that he wanted.

It wasn’t until Seheron, until years of dead children, dead brothers, and dead dreams that Bull had understood her sorrow. Desire was a hard master, but Bull had fought it and won.

So why now, with this strange, small woman, did Bull remember all of those half-forgotten dreams?

He wondered how she would react to being asked to prove herself as _kadan._

He wondered what she would look like wearing a necklace with half-a-dragon’s tooth… and nothing else.

Bull slammed that thought to the back of his mind and looked at her coolly, consideringly.

He had thought it was going to be “no”, but maybe that had never been an option in the first place.

So not “no”, but “not yet”.

Bull smiled and, in his mind, Tama smiled too. “We’re a bit tied up now, Boss. Let’s see how it goes after we root out the assassins.”

There were soft noises ahead, something that sounded too much like a struggle. Sharp ears caught the sounds, which distracted her from the entirety of his answer. 

"Not yet, but maybe if you buy me dinner, first," she said in absent response, then blinked as what she'd said-- and what he'd actually said caught up with her. Her blush was furious and she dipped her head, turned to the noises.

“Well,” said Bull, grinning, as he fell in beside her, moving towards the noise. Fuck, he was ready to kill something.

“I’m all out of candies, but maybe you’ve got some other suggestions…”

The Inquisitor glanced up at him through her lashes, sidelong, eyes alight that he was (finally) willing to play. "The tiny cakes weren't bad," she said, as they came upon the grove. A rift glowed faintly, and she curled her fingers around her mark, scanning the area.

Hawke's hound was sniffing at the ground by the rift. The bushes rustled and revealed a rumpled Champion, followed by a slightly less rumpled but considerably more smug Varric.

"Looks like we found the party," she said, moments before the duchess arrived to oversee the latest attempt at killing them.

***

 

In later years when Bull tried to describe what happened next, he’d get as far as the garden before shaking his head and mumbling something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, “The fucking gods don’t do subtle.” He never got beyond that part, although he understood that Maryden had a full shitty song cycle dedicated to it. Bull never understood why Leliana hadn’t locked that one down- she had a better spy network than anything he’d been able to build.

Sitting there in the moment though, Bull hadn’t been nearly as confident. Fighting in buildings was shit at the best of times and the Duchess knew the ground far better than they did. When she ran across the open space, her companions blocking her retreat, Bull was afraid that they’d lose her entirely. 

When Bull saw the blow headed for the Boss’ back, there wasn’t even a second of hesitation. He was sorry that he was never going to get that dance, but he couldn’t think of a better way to go.

In that moment he knew and was at peace.

The blow never landed.

How a house-sized dragon could move so silently, Bull would never know, but he found himself flung to the side, half of the strings of his epaulet stuck on Fluffy’s teeth, and Fluffy’s claw skewering the would-be murderer.

Obviously Fluffy had gotten bored of waiting.

Before anyone could move or breathe, Fluffy had lazily moved over to the Grand Duchess Florianne-

-and swallowed her whole.

As what seemed like the entirety of Celene’s court stared at the scene in stunned silence, Fluffy’s jaw worked up and down before making a painful sounding crunching noise.

Fluffy gave out an indignant bellow spitting what was left of the Duchess, Bull’s epaulet, and something white and sharp out of her mouth.

As Bull watched in stunned disbelief, the white shard arced through the air beside the remains of his epaulet’s strings, slowly descending towards the ground beside him. 

The dragon tooth fell neatly into two pieces, Bull’s length of silk cord coming to land on top of it.

Bull looked at the tooth.

Bull looked at the silken cord.

Bull lay there, dirty, bruised, and deliriously happy, and laughed until his breath gave out.


	6. Epilogue

Bull was more than happy to admit when he was wrong.

It didn’t happen often, but when it did it probably involved the Inquisitor. Dragons were useful for more than hacking to pieces, it was possible to be fucked without fucking someone, and maybe his role within the Qun was a little more flexible than he or Tama had ever imagined. Overall, Bull was pretty happy for a _hissrad_ who discovered that his lies were weak shadows of the lies he thought were truths.

Turns out the fourth major political victory was to have a massive fucking dragon on your side. It was amazing how quickly politicians caved when faced with a mouth full of tree-sized teeth.

Bull was happy enough that he ignored the woman who smelled of magic and trouble to make his way towards the woman leaning against the balcony railing.

Choices. It always came down to choices. Bull had taken them away and had them taken away in turn. He’d never understood Tama when she’d talked about paths bending rather than marching on in a straight line forever.

He understood her better now, understood the power of choice, even in the face of the inevitable. There was more than one way to move, more than one way to live, even if the path was set before him.

Tama wasn’t all right though. Bull could see now that it had never been just one path. The road had always opened onto a thousand other branches.

Maybe it was time to try them.

Bull smiled as he bowed, his heart finally in time with his mind.

“Would you like to dance?”


End file.
